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Evil Knee-Jerk Reflex
"Evil Knee-Jerk Reflex" was the 31st Special Comment delivered on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, airing on 19 May 2008 in order to clarify a point made five days prior. The Comment Finally, as promised, a post-script tonight regarding last week's Special Comment. You may remember Mr. Bush had used a cumbersome phrase to describe insurgents in Iraq, "cold-blooded killers who will kill people to achieve their political objectives." Last Wednesday, I quoted that phrase from the Politico.com interview to say that Mr. Bush had now also given America cold-blooded killers who will kill people to achieve their political objectives. I identified them as Mr. Bush's personnel, quote, "those in or formally in your employ, who may yet be charged someday with war crimes." I also described the chaos of post invasion Iraq with an "American viceroy, enforced by mercellous mercenaries who shoot unarmed Iraqis and then evade prosecution in any country by hiding behind Mr. Bush's skirts." No writer or broadcaster is ever as precise and clear as he thinks he is. Television goes by quickly and the viewers are not provided a copy of the script. So it is possible that reasonable viewers might have been confused by exactly to whom I referred, especially considering that I edited the original line, which was: "Mr. Bush, at long last, has it not dawned on you that the America you have now created includes cold-blooded killers who will kill people to achieve their political objectives? They are called your cabinet and your Pentagon." During the editing process, it seemed that was a little broad, that there appear to be men in both of those places, General Ricardo Sanchez, former Secretary of State Colin Powell, perhaps even the new Secretary of Defense Mr. Gates, who did not merit inclusion in that list. Obviously, my use of Mr. Bush's phrase, cold-blooded killers, did not refer to U.S. troops. I have never had anything but the highest respect for them and their sacrifice. This newscast constantly advocates their causes, their needs, our collective debt to them. And we constantly call out the administration on its failures to honor them, to protect them, to stop the Pentagon from sticking a band-aid on those whose hearts and minds are broken, and send them back for another tour. The U.S. troops in Iraq, even those few who have done bad things there, are still victims in this equation, and most are the proverbial innocent bystanders. My use of Mr. Bush's phrase, cold-blooded killers, referred not to the them, but rather to those former and current members of Mr. Bush's administration and Pentagon who so irresponsibly unleashed the hounds of war and may indeed someday face war crimes trials. And that phrase merciless mercenaries seemed to be self-explanatory. Neither are these U.S. troops, not when there are literally mercenaries in Mr. Bush's employ, principally from Blackwater USA, who literally shot unarmed Iraqis, most infamously in a massacre in Baghdad last September. Strangely, when the terms cold-blood killers and mercenaries were used in a public forum, my critics in the lunatic fringe, rather than even considering that the criticism even might be directed at the Pentagon or the administration or Blackwater USA, immediately decided that these were descriptions of our American heroes fighting in Iraq. It is perhaps instructive, I think, that to the right wing commentators and right wing blogs those terms should first invoke not the war-mongers of the Pentagon, nor the gunmen from Blackwater, but U.S. troops. I can not imagine that kind of evil knee-jerk reflex. I feel very sorry for those who have shown it. It seems to me that these right wingers have inadvertently shown then their true colors, their instinctive hatred for and contempt for those self-sacrificing Americans who have been needlessly placed in harm's way by these very commentators and the politicians they support. They hear criticism of our nation's collective conduct in Iraq and they immediately assume it's the fault of the soldiers. In the wake of an insult that exists only in their minds and never in my words nor in my heart, there remains, I think, only one question to ask: Laura Ingraham and Mark Levin, why do you hate our troops? See Also Category:2008 Special Comments